PART IV. EMINENT EXTEMPORE SPEAKERS.

AUGUSTINE—LUTHER—CHATHAM—PITT—BURKE—MIRABEAU—PATRICK HENRY—WHITEFIELD—WESLEY—SIDNEY SMITH—F. W. ROBERTSON—CLAY—BASCOM—SUMMERFIELD—SPURGEON—H. W. BEECHER—BINGHAM—GLADSTONE—SIMPSON—WENDELL PHILLIPS—J. P. DURBIN.

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EMINENT SPEAKERS.

USE OF EXAMPLES.

Notwithstanding the popularity of unwritten speech, and the innumerable arguments in its favor, there is an impression in some quarters that the very highest excellence cannot be attained without the previous use of the pen. It may be shown that it is more natural to find the words in which our thoughts are clothed at the moment of expression; that a stronger and better frame-work of thought can be constructed, if the mind, in preparing for speech, is occupied with that alone; that the speaker and hearer may thus be brought into closer union; that this, in short, is the order of nature, which leaves the solid frame-work of the tree standing through many winters, but each spring bestows its graceful robe of leaves upon that which was prepared to receive it. But this is not enough to produce lasting conviction. It is still maintained, almost with obstinacy, that in the highest fields of oratory, words must be previously chosen, fitted together, and polished.

This nearly every speech-writer proves from his own experience. The efforts that have afforded him most satisfaction were those in which nothing had been left to the chance of the moment. But it is easy to see how even experience may mislead in this particular. We can judge the comparative merits of another in his different modes of address with some approach to accuracy, for our mental state—that of listeners—continues the same under them all. But it is different when we judge ourselves. When we extemporize, our best expressions 134fade from the mind after they have been given forth, and can only be recalled by a strong effort. On the other hand, when we have wrought our language slowly, and lingered over each sentence, we see all the beauty it contains, and begin to admire our own production. If we see anything faulty, instead of lamenting it, as we would an unfortunate, spoken sentence, we change it, and take credit for the keenness of our critical taste. Is it wonderful that when we come before an audience with an address made as nearly perfect as we can construct it in every line, and the whole clearly written, or firmly engraved on the memory, and then repeat it, with a full appreciation of each beauty as we pass along, that we consider it to be of far higher merit than the impassioned torrent poured forth on another occasion, when we scarcely knew that we were using words at all? If the people do not seem to appreciate it, their want of taste and culture affords a ready excuse for them, even if the speaker is not too much occupied with his own eloquence to notice them at all. He is always ready, too, with the examples of Massillon and Bossuet, or of Chalmers, to prove that it was thus the most powerful orators spoke.

We do not deny that great effects may be produced, under certain circumstances, by committed words. The fact that many actors have won great fame by repeating the words of others, proves how much may be done in this direction. It is but reasonable, that if some gifted minds can thrill an audience to tears, and rouse every feeling to its highest bent by merely copying others, that those who, in addition to this ability, possess the power of framing their own thoughts in suitable words, may accomplish as much. John B. Gough is an instance of the power that may be wielded in this manner. But such men cannot occupy the highest position in the temple of fame. They are but actors. When they speak they will be listened to with eagerness and pleasure, as great performers always are, but it will be as performers rather than as authorities. They have placed themselves on a level with those who deal in unreal things, and there 135they must be content to remain. Doubtless it is more noble to speak the sentiments and feelings that we once possessed, in the language adapted to that time, than to deal in those belonging to another person, but the resemblance between the two is very close, and the people feel it so acutely that they make no discrimination.

But we maintain that even in momentary effect—the quality which is supposed to belong peculiarly to the powerful declamation of prepared language—extempore speakers have passed beyond all others; while in power of thought and lasting influence, there can be no comparison. There is no single quality of speech that cannot be reached as well without writing as with it, while perpetual readiness, vast and profound knowledge (which writing extensively leaves no time to acquire), and weight and authority with the people, belong almost exclusively to the extemporizer.

These assertions may seem bold to many, but we are prepared to substantiate them. In the preceding pages we have aimed to show how this species of address may be acquired, and improved to an almost unlimited degree. The ideal thus sketched is not an impossible or imaginary one. It has often been attained, and for the encouragement of those who may be disposed to throw away their manuscripts, and trust to the method of nature, the following examples are selected. These are chosen because of their eminence, and also because of the wide variety of qualities displayed in their eloquence. Many more might be given, but these are sufficient for our purpose, which is to show that in every department of speech the highest eloquence that ever flowed from the lips of men has clothed itself in unpremeditated words.

In these sketches we, of course, make no pretension to originality, but have compiled what was adapted to our purpose from every available source. And as the matter so obtained has been frequently abridged, and two or three different accounts woven together, it has sometimes been impossible to give full credit. We are under especial obligation to 136the “New American Cyclopedia,” Mosheim’s Church History, Stevens’s History of Methodism, Harsha’s “Orators and Statesmen,” “Kidder’s Homiletics,” with the current biographies of the speakers treated of.

Much of the oratory of antiquity was recited. This has been used as an argument to prove the comparative inferiority of that speech which is the offspring of the moment, forgetting the great difference between ancient and modern life—a difference arising from the greater diversity of the latter, and the nobler aims to which it gives birth. The typical Grecian oration is as much a work of art as a statue. It was made to be admired, and if, by the beauty of its arrangement, the melody of its language, and the elegance of its delivery, this object was achieved, the orator was satisfied. It was so, to a less degree, in the classic age of Rome. The form of the oration was of greater importance than its matter, and it was judged that this would be best perfected by the use of the pen, and of the memory. Yet the practice of antiquity on this point was far from uniform. Some of the noblest orators spoke extempore, and have less fame than those who adopted the opposite plan, only because at that time the art of reporting was too imperfect to preserve their eloquence. The effect they produced remains, and from it we obtain a faint view of their greatness. Pericles spoke without previous writing, and the sway his speech established over his countrymen was more undisputed than that of Demosthenes. The latter had an assemblage of talents that, with his tireless industry, would have made him eminent in any mode of address that he might have adopted; but even he did not recite exclusively.

The great rival of Cicero, Hortensius, whose wonderful power excited the emulation of the former, spoke from the impulse of the moment, as did many of the more eminent of the Roman orators. Cicero was a man of tireless energy. He applied himself to the study and practice of eloquence with a singleness of aim, and a concentration of purpose that may well command our admiration. He accumulated vast 137stores of knowledge, perfected his logic, and improved his voice until it became music, and brought all the resources of a mighty mind to bear on oratory. It is not wonderful that he was listened to with profound attention, while he recited what he had previously composed. But some of his most brilliant passages were extemporaneous. The outburst that overwhelmed Catiline when he unexpectedly appeared in the senate, was coined, at white heat, by the passion of the moment.

The reason why so many of the ancients committed their speeches, was because they could not be preserved otherwise, unless the orator could remember and write down what he had said. Every unwritten speech perished, and left nothing but a dim memory of the results it had produced. This is the reason why the extempore speakers of the ancient world are less known than the reciters. But the art of short-hand has effected a revolution in this particular, and the most impassioned speeches are now photographed for the admiration of future generations. The man who wishes his speech preserved is no longer compelled to write it.

EARLY PREACHING IN THE CHURCH.

We may be sure that the preaching of Christ and the Apostles was without notes. It seems scarcely less than profanation to picture even the latter as reading from a previously prepared manuscript, after they had been promised the help of the Spirit in the hour when help was needed; and it is inconceivable that the Saviour should have taken any other mode of imparting His wisdom to men, than that of direct address. Paul deprecated the eloquence of mere words, although the sketch of his sermon on Mars’ Hill, with other addresses, shows that he did not neglect the eloquence of thought, and the strength of orderly, logical arrangement. We have no direct evidence of the manner of preaching in the first century, but from all intimations we are led to conclude that sermons were composed without the 138use of the pen, and consisted of easy, familiar scripture expositions and deductions of moral lessons. Origen, the most celebrated divine of the third century, preached without manuscript, and Eusebius says of him:

“Then, as was to be expected, our religion spreading more and more, and our brethren beginning to converse more freely with all, Origen, who they say was now more than sixty years of age, and who, from long practice, had acquired great facility in discoursing, permitted his discourses to be taken down by ready writers, a thing which he had never allowed before.”

This shows not only that he had been accustomed to preach extempore, but that he would not permit the sketches of his sermons which could be made by the imperfect reporting of that day, to be published until late in life. This would be very natural, when unstudied explanation was the main object of the address, but very unnatural if the sermon had been written according to the rules of rhetorical composition. In the sermons of Chrysostom there are many passages which could not, from their nature, have been precomposed, and these are among the most brilliant of all. But Augustine, who flourished in the fourth century, affords us a still more conclusive proof of the power of the natural mode of address.

AUGUSTINE.

The father of this great man was a pagan, but his mother was a Christian. She was a most remarkable woman, and from her he doubtless inherited some of the strongest elements of his character. Her prayers for his conversion were almost continual, but for many years produced no apparent result. He plunged into many excesses, and lived a most irregular life, but from this he was aroused by the death of his father, and by the study of philosophy. For a time the latter seemed to satisfy his ardent mind, but soon he saw its insufficiency, became an earnest searcher for truth, and explored 139the writings of the sages of antiquity without being able to find anything on which he could rest. The problems of life pressed upon him with a terrible weight, and he was too profound a thinker to be satisfied with any superficial explanation. The doctrine of the ancient Persians—that of the two antagonistic principles of good and evil in the world—for a while charmed his imagination, but its influence over him soon passed away. During all this time he was rising in fame as a teacher of rhetoric and eloquence, and had established a school in Rome which became widely celebrated.

His reputation as a teacher caused him to be summoned to Milan, where the Emperor then was. The great preacher, Ambrose, then in the zenith of his power, officiated in that city. Augustine heard him, and felt that his doubts were answered. But it required a terrible struggle before he could yield, and it was only after he had passed the whole series of Christian doctrines in review, and tested them by all his mighty power of argument, that he at last reposed in the truth. The joy of his good mother can scarcely be conceived at this answer to her unceasing prayer, and she soon passed away triumphantly. He spent a short period in seclusion and profound meditation, was then baptized, and four years after began to preach.

The success of Augustine was as great in preaching as it had been in teaching, and he was promoted to the office of Bishop. His power was soon felt all over the Christian world. He at once entered on a course of labor like that of Whitefield and Wesley, but still more varied. He preached once every day, and sometimes twice; visited the sick and poor with great assiduity; governed his diocese wisely; was the Christian champion against almost innumerable forms of heresy all over the world; composed some most beautiful hymns; wrote extensive commentaries that are still valued; kept up a vast correspondence with emperors, kings, and church dignitaries everywhere; and indited works of theology, literature, criticism, and philosophy in immense profusion. Some of these will live as long as the language 140in which they are written is known. For thirty-five years he remained at his post, and died at last, while his city was beleagured by a barbarian army, in time to escape witnessing the ruin that burst on the flock he had so long loved and served.

The power of Augustine as a preacher can scarcely be overrated. Everywhere the people flocked to hear him, and the most enduring fruits followed his ministry. His sermons were not calculated simply to win admiration for the preacher, but pointed to the holier life, and led men to love and strive after it. He was the real founder of what is known at the present day as Calvinism, and by his vast power made it the prevailing doctrine of the church for centuries after his death. There can be no question about his sincerity and earnestness, and just as little regarding the influence of his solemn eloquence. He quieted tumults, changed the opinions of whole towns, and wielded assemblies at his will. He left a large number of sermons in a fragmentary condition, but fully justifying all that his contemporaries have written of him.

It is not possible that such a man should have read or recited his discourses. To have done so would have left him no time for such grand works as the “Confessions,” “City of God,” and others too numerous to mention, which will endure while the world stands. But he has not left us in doubt as to his mode of preaching. He enjoins the “Christian teacher” to make his hearers comprehend what he says, “to read in the eyes and countenances of his auditors whether they understand him or not, and to repeat the same thing by giving it different terms, till he perceives that it is understood, an advantage which those cannot have who, by a servile dependence on their memories, learn their sermons by heart, and repeat them as so many lessons. Let not the preacher become the servant of words; rather let words be servants to the preacher.” In his charity, however, he does allow of reciting under certain circumstances. “Those who are destitute of invention, but can 141speak well, provided they select well written discussions of another man and commit them to memory for the instruction of their hearers, will not do badly if they take this course.”

LUTHER.

The name of Luther is so well known that it will not be necessary to give more than a very brief sketch of his wonderful life. The peasant, who was raised by his virtues to more than kingly power, and to be the leader of the greatest religious movement of modern times, cannot be a stranger to the world. Luther was bred in the midst of poverty and almost of want. As he grew older, his father, who was a kind-hearted, though stern man, began to rise in the world, and found means to send him to school. The patronage of a wealthy lady named Cotta, was also of great benefit to him. He was distinguished very early for quickness and profundity of intellect, and the highest hopes were formed of him. But in the midst of flattering prospects, he was deeply convicted of sin, and terrified concerning his spiritual state. After he had spent a long time in mental struggles, full of agony, he resolved to become a monk, as the surest way of allaying all doubt, and obtaining the spiritual rest for which he longed. His father never forgave this step, until his son stood in direct opposition to the power of Rome. But the ardent heart of Luther could not find peace in the dull routine of a convent life, and every spiritual trial was redoubled. At last, while he was reading in an old copy of the Bible, which he had found in the library of the convent, the great doctrine of justification by faith dawned upon him with all the freshness of a new revelation. He at once began to teach the people the same blessed doctrine, with the most gratifying results. His preaching was marked by great power, and soon his sphere widened. He was made a doctor of divinity in the University of Wittenberg, and began to lecture on Paul’s Epistles, and the Psalms. He was still a devoted adherent of Rome, although he taught 142the students under his care to look to the Scriptures as the fountain of all authority. But the germs of the Reformation were already hid in his own mind, and it only required circumstances to bring them into vigorous life.

These were soon supplied. When a monk came to Wittenberg, selling pardons for every kind of sin, even that which was to be committed, Luther felt it his duty to warn the people against any dependence on such sources of forgiveness. The Pope took part with the monk in the strife that followed; and the contest went from one point to another, until the Pope hurled a decree of excommunication at Luther, which he burned, in the presence of his adherents, as a token of defiance and contempt. The reformation spread wonderfully, and although surrounded on every side by threatenings and enemies, the life of this great man was spared, and for years he exerted an influence in Germany not second to that of the Emperor himself. When he fell at last, in the midst of his labors, the people mourned for him as for a personal benefactor.

All through his life, Luther had the secret of reaching the hearts of the people in a wonderful manner. No other of the great men who abounded at that time possessed a tithe of his power in this respect. It has been said “that his words were half battles.” His discourses were not smooth or graceful, yet it was not for want of ability to secure these qualities, for he had great command of every style of language, and loved softer and more ornamented speech in others; but he was too much in earnest, with an empire, and the vastest hierarchy the world ever saw, arrayed against him, to stay to use them. Whenever he preached the people would flock together from great distances, and listen as to a prophet, while he unfolded the grand and simple plan of salvation in the plainest words. He had every element of a great preacher. His imagination was most vivid, and he did not fail to use it to the utmost. He could paint a scene in all the completeness of action before his hearers, and awaken their tears or smiles at his will. He used no manuscript, but 143spoke from the vast fulness of knowledge he possessed on every subject. His pen was employed as well as his voice. By it he not only produced a great number of books that advanced the cause of the Reformation almost as much as his spoken efforts, but by the combination of the two methods of expression, writing to meet the eye and speaking for the ear, he taught himself both accuracy and readiness, and was thus prepared for the part he was called upon to act. Added to these, were his strong emotions, and indomitable will, which gave him an energy that bore every thing before him. For beauty and grace in themselves he cared nothing, but when they came unbidden, as they often did, they were welcome. He rightly estimated his own character and work when he said “that he was rough, boisterous, stormy, and altogether warlike; born to fight innumerable devils and monsters, to remove stumps and stones, to cut down thistles and thorns, and to clear the wild woods.”

LORD CHATHAM.

It may well be doubted whether the eloquence of this great and wonderful man did not surpass that of either Cicero or Demosthenes. It is certain that the effects he repeatedly produced have never been surpassed. And he had not to deal with a populace easily moved, although cultivated in some particulars, as they had; but his mightiest triumphs were won in the British Parliament, from an acute, critical, and often hostile assembly. His example, with that of his son, who was almost equally great, afford an irrefutable answer to those who doubt the capacity of unwritten speech to convey impressions as mighty as any ever produced by man.

He was born in 1708, and was educated at Oxford, quitting it without a degree, but with a brilliant reputation. Soon after he entered Parliament, and gained such power that he was shortly advanced to the office of Prime Minister. This was in the reign of George II. and at the opening of the Seven Years War, by which England won the province 144of Canada, and became the most powerful empire in the world. But when he took the reins of government it was far different. The armies of the nation had been beaten in every quarter, and the people were almost in despair. But he infused new spirit into them, and by his energy and farsighted combinations, won the most glorious series of triumphs that ever crowned the arms of England. His fame did not cease when he left the ministry, and, in America at least, he is best known for his friendly words to us during the revolutionary war. He opposed with all the strength of his wondrous eloquence the oppressive measures that provoked the colonists to revolution. Yet there was no element of fear or compromise in his disposition. He only opposed the ministry in their government of our country because he believed their measures to be unjust. But when, after seven years of defeat and disaster, the body of the nation became convinced that the Americans never could be conquered, and the proposition was made to recognize their independence, Chatham fought against the accomplishment of the separation with all his vigor. He made his last speech on this subject, and while the house was still under the solemn awe that followed his address, he was stricken down by apoplexy and borne home to die.

We have little upon which to base an estimate of this almost unequalled orator, save the effect he produced upon his contemporaries. Nothing has been preserved of his speeches, but a few passages that stamped themselves indelibly upon the minds of his hearers. Yet through his eloquence, backed by his strong will, he was for many years virtually dictator of England, and even when most alone, scarcely any one dared to meet him in debate.

Many curious instances are given of the uncontrolled ascendency he obtained over the House of Commons. His most celebrated rival was Murray, Earl of Mansfield, who had just been promoted to the office of Attorney-General, when the incident narrated below occurred. Chatham made a speech, really intended to overwhelm Murray, but on a 145totally different subject. Fox says “every word was Murray, yet so managed that neither he nor anybody else could take public notice of it or in any way reprehend him. I sat near Murray, who suffered for an hour. At its close he used an expression that at once became proverbial.” After the unhappy Attorney had writhed for a time, and endured the terrible, but indirect, satire of Chatham until endurance was scarcely possible any longer, the latter stopped, threw his piercing eyes around as if in search of something, then fixing their whole force on his victim, exclaimed, “I must now address a few words to Mr. Attorney; they shall be few, but they shall be daggers!” Murray was agitated; the look was continued, and the agitation became so uncontrollable as to be noticed by the whole house. “Felix trembles,” roared Chatham, in a voice of thunder, “he shall hear me some other day.” Murray was too completely stricken to attempt a reply.

On another occasion, having finished a speech, he walked out of the house with a slow step, being at the time an habitual invalid. There was a profound silence until he was passing through the door. Then a member started up, saying, “Mr. Speaker, I rise to reply to the right honorable gentleman.” Chatham caught the sound, turned back, and fixed his eye on the orator, who instantly sat down. He then walked slowly to his seat, repeating in Latin, as he hobbled along, the lines from Virgil, in which is described the terror of the Grecian ghosts when Æneas entered the dark realm:

“The Grecian chiefs....

When they beheld the MAN with shining arms

Amid those shades, trembled with sodden fear,

... and raised

A feeble outcry; but the sound commenced,

Died on their gurgling lips.”

Reaching his seat, he exclaimed in a tone that terrified the whole house, “Now let me hear what the honorable gentleman has to say to me.” There was no response, and the 146whole body was too much awed to laugh at the situation of the poor orator.

Yet he did not deal in the terrible and overpowering all the time. In a most eloquent speech in opposition to a measure that he believed violated the sanctity of the English home, he gave the following description of that privilege which is justly the proudest boast of an Englishman. A single passage is all that remains, but it will not soon be forgotten:

“The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the Crown. It may be frail—its roof may shake—the wind may blow through it—the storm may enter—the rain may enter—but the King of England cannot enter!—all his forces dare not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement!”

Lord Macaulay, who was in no sense friendly to the great orator, gives him a glowing eulogy:

“His figure, when he first appeared in Parliament, was strikingly graceful and commanding, his features high and noble, his eye full of fire. His voice, even when it sank to a whisper, was heard to the remotest benches; when he strained it to its full extent, the sound rose like the swell of the organ of a great cathedral, shook the house with its peal, and was heard through lobbies, and down staircases, to the Court of Requests, and the precincts of Westminster Hall. He cultivated all these eminent advantages with the most assiduous care. His action is described by a very malignant observer as equal to that of Garrick. His play of countenance was wonderful; he frequently disconcerted a hostile orator by a single glance of indignation or scorn. Every tone, from the impassioned cry to the thrilling aside, was perfectly at his command.”

He was a truly extemporaneous speaker, and seldom attempted any other style. When he did he failed. His memory was strong and retentive, and his mind so fully stored with information on every subject that he was always ready for debate. Some of his grandest efforts were called forth by an unexpected circumstance, or a single glance of his eye. Once, while replying to Suffolk, he caught a view 147of the tapestry on which was painted some of the achievements of the ancestors of that lord, and instantly seized the hint it conveyed and gave expression to one of the noblest bursts of eloquence in any language. One of his contemporaries says:

“When without forethought or any other preparation than those talents nature had supplied, and education cultivated, Chatham rose—stirred to anger by some sudden subterfuge of corruption, or device of tyranny—then was heard an eloquence never surpassed either in ancient or modern times. It was the highest power of expression ministering to the highest power of thought.”

WILLIAM PITT.

The manner in which the younger Pitt succeeded to the talents and position of the elder is one of the most wonderful things in history. His father trained him from his infancy in the models which he himself had imitated so successfully. Some of these means of improvement, which at least assisted in producing the peculiar character of the eloquence of father and son, are worthy of our attention. They both translated from the best classical authors, committed to memory choice passages from the poets, and prose writers they valued, thus acquiring great command of words. With such previous training, it would have been useless for them to write even in their most elaborate efforts.

When the younger Pitt had finished the traditional college course and was admitted to the bar, he also entered Parliament, being then only twenty-three years of age. He delivered his first speech, which was entirely unpremeditated, only about a month afterward. It took the house by storm. In the midst of that brilliant assembly, accustomed to the eloquence of Fox, Burke, and others worthy of any age, there was a universal burst of enthusiastic admiration. When some one remarked, “Pitt promises to be one of the first speakers ever heard in Parliament,” Fox replied, “He is so already.”

148When only twenty-four years of age he was made Prime Minister, and held the post for seventeen years. Although there is room for a wide difference of opinion regarding many of his acts during this time, there is none concerning his ability. Among other reforms that he advocated was the abolition of the slave trade. He made a speech on this subject that is still celebrated. Wilberforce said that “for the last twenty minutes he really seemed to be inspired.” Windham declares “that he walked home lost in amazement at the compass, until then unknown to him, of human eloquence.” Pitt died at the comparatively early age of forty-seven, holding the highest office in the gift of his country.

Brougham gives a glowing account of his power as an orator. “He is to be placed without any doubt in the highest class. With a sparing use of ornament, hardly indulging more in figures, or even in figurative expression, than the most severe examples of ancient chasteness allowed—with little variety of style, hardly any of the graces of manner—he no sooner rose than he carried away every hearer, and kept the attention fixed and unflagging until it pleased him to let it go; and then

“’So charming left his voice that we awhile

Still thought him speaking, still stood fixed to hear.’

“This magical effect was produced by his unbroken flow, which never for a moment left the hearer in pain or doubt, and yet was not the mean fluency of mere relaxation, requiring no effort of the speaker, but imposing on the listener a heavy task; by his lucid arrangement, which made all parts of the most complicated subject quit their entanglement and fall each in its place; by the clearness of his statements which presented a picture to the mind; by the forcible appeals to strict reason and strong feeling which formed the great staple of the discourse; by the majesty of the diction; by the depth and fullness of the most sonorous voice and the unbending dignity of the manner, which ever reminded us that we were in the presence of more than the mere advocate 149and debater, that there stood before us a ruler of the people. Such were the effects invariably of this singular eloquence; nor did anything, in any mood of mind, ever drop from him that was unsuited to the majestic frame of the whole, or could disturb the serenity of the full and copious flood that rolled along.”

Macaulay says: “At his first appearance in Parliament he showed himself superior to all his contemporaries in command of language. He could pour out a long succession of round and stately periods, without ever pausing for a word, without ever repeating a word, in a voice of silver clearness, and with a pronunciation so articulate that not a letter was slurred over.”

These men, father and son, were never excelled in debate. They were always ready. Every advantage that the occasion allowed was taken at the time, and the favorable moment never went by while they were preparing. They each attained a power they never would have possessed had it been necessary for them to use manuscript or depend on their memory. The time others have wasted in writing special orations, they employed in such wide culture, and in accumulating such vast stores of knowledge, that they were always ready. They were able to come to great intellectual contests with their minds fresh and un-fagged by previous composition.

But it may be said that with all their power they were destitute of polish and beauty. In such fragments of their speeches as have been preserved, it is true that gracefulness is less conspicuous than force, and the opponent of unwritten speech may imagine that this is a necessary consequence of the manner in which they spoke. The advantage they gained was worth the cost, even if this lack of the finer and more elegant qualities of speech was inevitable. But that this does not necessarily result from extempore speech, is abundantly proved by the example of their great rival—

150

EDMUND BURKE.

This prince of imaginative orators was an Irishman. He was born in 1730, and graduated in Dublin University at the age of twenty. For a short time afterward he studied law, but soon grew weary of it and turned his attention to philosophy and literature. The productions of his pen speedily won an enviable reputation. A “Vindication of Natural Society” was speedily followed by the celebrated “Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful.”

His appearance in Parliament, the great arena of British eloquence, was comparatively late in life, but as soon as elected he gave promise of the great brilliancy he afterward displayed. For more than thirty years he had no superior in that august body, and scarcely an equal. He stood side by side with Pitt in defence of America, and endeared himself to every lover of liberty in both hemispheres. The great impeachment of Warren Hastings was mainly brought about by his influence, and afforded room for all his powers. The war with France was the last great theme upon which his eloquence was employed, and in it his strongly conservative views alienated him from most of his former friends.

During all this time his eloquence was a wonder both to friend and foe, and in its own style was never equalled in the House of Commons, or in the world. His speech on the impeaching of Warren Hastings, made at the bar of the House of Lords, was an unparalleled effort. It extended over a period of four days, and bore everything before it. On the third day of this great speech, he described the cruelties inflicted on some of the natives of India by one of Hastings’s agents, with such vividness that one convulsive shudder ran through the whole assemblage, while the speaker was so much affected by the picture he had penciled, that he dropped his head upon his hands, and was for some moments unable to proceed. Some, who were present, fell into a swoon, while even Hastings himself, who disclaimed all responsibility 151for these things, was overwhelmed. In speaking of the matter afterwards he says: “For half an hour I looked upon the orator in a revery of wonder, and actually felt myself to be the most culpable man on earth.” Lord Thurlow, who was present, declares that long after, many who were present had not recovered from the shock, and probably never would.

Soon after, the great speech of Sheridan was delivered. Like Burke’s, it was extempore, and no report of it, worthy the name, remains. It was only inferior to the mighty effort that preceded it. A clergyman who came to the house strongly prepossessed in favor of Hastings, said at the close of the first hour, to a friend who sat by him, “This is mere declamation without proof.” When another hour had passed, he remarked, “This is a wonderful oration.” Another hour went by, and again he spoke: “Warren Hastings certainly acted unjustifiably.” At the end of the fourth hour he said: “Hastings is an atrocious criminal.” When the speech closed at the end of the fifth hour, he vehemently declared, “Of all monsters of iniquity, Warren Hastings is certainly the most enormous.”

For seven long years this unprecedented trial went on. More than one-third of those who sat on the judge’s bench when it began were in their graves. When, at last it drew to a close, Burke made to the Lords a closing charge worthy of his genius:

“My Lords,” said he, “I have done! The part of the Commons is concluded! With a trembling hand we consign the product of these long, long labors to your charge. Take it! Take it! It is a sacred trust! Never before was a cause of such magnitude submitted to any human tribunal.... My Lords, it has pleased Providence to place us in such a stage that we appear every moment to be on the verge of some great mutation. There is one thing, and one thing only that defies mutation—that which existed before the world itself. I mean JUSTICE; that justice which, emanating from the Divinity, has a place in the breast of every one of us, given us for our guide with regard to ourselves 152and with regard to others; and which will stand after this globe is burned to ashes, our advocate or our accuser before our great Judge, when He comes to call upon us for the tenor of a well spent life.”

The effect of this speech upon the auditory was such that it was only after some time had elapsed, and after repeated efforts, that Fox, himself a giant in eloquence, could obtain a hearing.

The character of Burke’s eloquence is well summed up in the following account, given by Wraxall, one of his contemporaries:

“Nature had bestowed on him a boundless imagination, aided by a memory of equal strength and tenacity. His fancy was so vivid that it seemed to light up by its own powers, and to burn without consuming the aliment on which it fed: sometimes bearing him away into ideal scenes created by his own exuberant mind, but from which he, sooner or later, returned to the subject of debate; descending from his most aerial flights, by a gentle and imperceptible gradation, till he again touched the ground. Learning waited on him like a handmaid, presenting to his choice all that antiquity has culled or invented, most elucidatory of the topic under discussion. He always seemed to be oppressed under the load and variety of his intellectual treasures. Every power of oratory was wielded by him in its turn; for he could be, during the same evening, often within the space of a few minutes, pathetic and humorous; acrimonious and conciliating; now giving loose to his indignation or severity; and then, almost in the same breath, calling to his assistance wit and ridicule. It would be endless to cite instances of this versatility of his disposition, and of the rapidity of his transitions,

‘From grave to gay, from lively to severe,’

that I have, myself, witnessed. . . . What he was in public he was in private; like the star which now precedes and now follows the sun, he was equally brilliant whether he

‘Flamed in the forehead of the morning sky,’

or led on with a milder luster the modest hosts of evening.”

153A Frenchman gives a graphic description of one of his speeches. At first he was disappointed in his appearance.

“I certainly did not expect to find him in the British Parliament dressed in the ancient toga; nor was I prepared to see him in a tight brown coat, which seemed to impede every movement, and above all, the little hat-wig with curls. . . . He moved into the middle of the house contrary to the usual practice, for the members speak standing and uncovered, not leaving their places. But Mr. Burke, with the most natural air imaginable, with seeming humility, and with folded arms, began his speech in so low a tone of voice that I could scarcely hear him. Soon after, however, becoming animated by degrees, he described religion attacked, the bonds of subordination broken, civil society threatened to its foundation.... When in the course of this grand sketch, (to show that England could depend only on herself,) he mentioned Spain, that immense monarchy, which appeared to have fallen into a total lethargy: ‘What can we expect,’ said he, ‘from her?—mighty indeed, but unwieldy—vast in bulk, but inert in spirit—a whale stranded upon the sea shore of Europe.’ The whole House was silent; every mind was fixed; ... never was the electric power of eloquence more imperiously felt. I have witnessed many, too many political assemblages and striking scenes where eloquence performed a noble part, but the whole of them appear insipid when compared with this amazing effort.”

Burke was an extemporaneous speaker in the sense we have used the word in the preceding pages. He thought over the ideas of his speech as fully as his time permitted, and when he spoke, threw them into the language of the moment. At the conclusion of one of his speeches on the American question, his friends crowded around and urged him to write what he had said for the benefit of the world. He did so then, and also on five other occasions. Of the hundreds of other speeches he delivered only broken and imperfect fragments remain.

Burke exerted himself in conversation, and thus improved his powers of language in the method we have recommended. Dr. Johnson says of him in his oracular way:

154“Burke is an extraordinary man. His stream of talk is perpetual; and he does not talk from any desire of distinction, but because his mind is full. He is the only man whose common conversation corresponds with the general fame he has in the world. Take him up where you please, he is ready to meet you. No man of sense could meet him by accident under a gateway to avoid a shower without being convinced that he was the first man in England.”

MIRABEAU.

The career of Mirabeau more resembles a strange romance than a sober history. He was of a good family, but during his childhood and early manhood his father treated him like a brute. His very appearance was peculiar. His head was of enormous size, his body so much misshapen that his father, who persecuted him for his deformity, declared that he looked more like a monster than a human being. The whole of his early life presents a picture of dreariness and misery exceeding that of almost any other man who has risen to greatness. Several times he was imprisoned—once for three years and a half—by order of his unnatural parent. Finally he began to use his pen, and soon won general admiration. His father, having failed to crush him, now became reconciled, and allowed him to assume the family name, which he had not permitted before. By this time he had a wide experience of vice, and was deeply in debt. His struggles for several years were still severe.

But at length the great revolution came, and he found his true element. The powers of speech which had already been displayed to a limited extent, were now exercised in a noble field. The people soon recognized in him the qualities necessary for a leader, and elected him to the General Assembly of France. Here he was feared and respected by all. He had no party to support him, but worked alone, and often by the mere force of his genius bent the Assembly to his will. During his whole career there, he was not an extremist, and for a time before his death was engaged in 155upholding the crown and the cause of constitutional government against the party of anarchy and death. This lost him his unbounded popularity with the fickle populace of Paris, and they began to shout for his blood. He was charged in the Assembly with corruption, and treason to the cause of liberty. This only prepared the way for his triumph. The very tree was marked on which he was to be hung. But he did not quail before the storm. When he reached the hall, he found himself in the midst of determined enemies already drunk with blood, and with no friend who dared to speak on his behalf. But the mere force of eloquence prevailed. He spoke in words of such power that the noisy multitude was stilled, and the tide turned.

After this triumph he took part in every measure, and was really the guiding power of the state. The king leaned on him as the only stay of his reign, and the moderate of every party began to look to him as the hope of France. Sometimes he spoke five times in one day, and at the sound of his magical voice the anarchical Assembly was hushed into reverence and submission. But his exertions were beyond his strength. At last he was prostrated. Every hour the king sent to enquire of his health, and bulletins of his state were posted in the streets. It seemed as if the destiny of France was to be decided in his sick chamber. He died, and the whole nation mourned, as well it might, for no other hand than his could hold back the reign of terror. It is indeed a problem whether that terrible tragedy would not have been prevented, if he had but lived a few months longer.

Some of the speeches of this remarkable man were recited, but in these he never attained his full power. A French writer well describes him:

“Mirabeau in the tribune was the most imposing of orators, an orator so consummate, that it is harder to say what he wanted than what he possessed.

“Mirabeau had a massive and square obesity of figure, thick lips, a forehead broad, bony, prominent; arched eyebrows, an eagle eye, cheeks flat, and somewhat fleshy, features 156full of pock holes and blotches, a voice of thunder, an enormous mass of hair, and the face of a lion.

“His manner as an orator is that of the great masters of antiquity, with an admirable energy of gesture, and a vehemence of diction which perhaps they had never reached.

“Mirabeau in his premeditated discourses was admirable. But what was he not in his extemporaneous effusions? His natural vehemence, of which he repressed the flights in his prepared speeches, broke down all barriers in his improvisations. A sort of nervous irritability gave then to his whole frame an almost preternatural animation and life. His breast dilated with an impetuous breathing. His lion face became wrinkled and contorted. His eyes shot forth flame. He roared, he stamped, he shook the fierce mass of his hair, all whitened with foam; he trod the tribune with the supreme authority of a master, and the imperial air of a king. What an interesting spectacle to behold him, momently, erect and exalt himself under the pressure of obstacle! To see him display the pride of his commanding brow! To see him, like the ancient orator, when, with all the power of his unchained eloquence, he was wont to sway, to and fro in the Forum, the agitated waves of the Roman multitude. Then would he throw by the measured notes of his declamation, habitually grave and solemn. Then would escape him broken exclamations, tones of thunder, and accents of heartrending and terrible pathos. He concealed with the flash and color of his rhetoric, the sinewy arguments of his dialectics. He transported the Assembly, because himself transported. And yet—so extraordinary was his force—he abandoned himself to the torrent of his eloquence, without wandering from his course; he mastered others by its sovereign sway, without losing for an instant his own self-control.”

PATRICK HENRY.

The fame of this great man cannot soon be surpassed. He not only produced a great impression at the time he spoke, but had an agency, by his eloquent words, in bringing 157about the most important changes. He was more than the mouthpiece of the American Revolution. He not merely interpreted the feelings of the mass of the nation to itself, but in a large degree originated the enthusiasm that led them through war to independence. It is certain that the aristocratic and powerful colony of Virginia would have occupied a far different place in the struggle for liberty, if it had been deprived of his almost irresistible influence. It is hard to speculate on what might have been the result if temporizing measures had carried the day, and the union of the colonies been interfered with by want of cordial sympathy. The political wisdom of Franklin, and the military skill and constancy of Washington, did not contribute more to final success than the bold councils and fervent utterances of the country lawyer who is the subject of our sketch.

Patrick Henry was born in Hanover county, Virginia, in May, 1736. In childhood he acquired the common elements of education, and some knowledge of Latin and mathematics, and was not the ignorant youth that some of his admirers delight in representing him. But he was exceedingly fond of hunting and fishing, and would often spend the hours in this way, that might have been devoted to more useful employment. But he became a great day dreamer, thus at once revealing and exercising the unbounded imagination he possessed. He loved to wander alone, that he might give full play to the visions and reveries that floated through his brain.

When about fourteen, he heard the celebrated Presbyterian minister, Samuel Davies. His eloquence was the most powerful that Henry had hitherto enjoyed, and awakened in him a spirit of emulation. All his life Henry delighted to do him honor, and attributed the bent of his own mind to oratory and a large measure of his success to this man.

In business, the future statesman was uniformly most unsuccessful. He twice failed as a storekeeper, and once as a farmer. But all this time he was really studying for his future profession. He was fond of talk, and by indulging in it freely 158doubtless improved his power of language. He would relate long stories, and do it so well that those who thronged his counter took as little note of time as he did, and yielded their hearts as fully to him as larger audiences did afterward.

As a last resort he studied law, but for a time his success was no better in this than in his previous occupations. But after two or three years, during which he lived without practice, and in a dependent condition, he was retained in what seemed merely a nominal capacity—as defendant in the noted “Parsons case.” The preachers of the established church were paid so many pounds of tobacco per annum. But when the price arose, in a time of scarcity, the Legislature passed an act allowing all persons to pay their assessment in money at the rate of 2d per pound, which was much less than it was worth at that time. After an interval this law was declared void by the king and his council. Then the clergy instituted suit to recover what they had lost during the time the act was enforced. There was no doubt of the legality of their claim, although more of its intrinsic rightfulness, and the law question was decided in a test case, almost without controversy. This really surrendered the whole matter, and the only issue then was as to the amount of damage they had sustained—a very plain question, apparently affording no room for argument by the defense.

A vast array of the clergy were present, and on the bench was Henry’s own father. No circumstances could be imagined more unfavorable for the maiden speech of a young lawyer. The case for the plaintiff was clearly and forcibly stated by a leading member of the bar, and Henry began his reply. It is no wonder that he faltered, and that his sentences were awkward and confused. The people, who were present in great numbers, and who were intensely hostile to the preachers, hung their heads, and gave up the contest. The father of the speaker was shame-faced and dismayed. The preachers smiled in derision, and exchanged congratulatory glances. But it was too soon. The power of eloquence 159began to assert itself. The strong mind of Henry mastered all embarrassment, and was brought to bear, with irresistible force, upon his subject, and upon those around. All eyes were drawn to the almost unknown speaker. His rusticity of manner had disappeared; his form became erect, and his piercing eyes shot forth lightning. “A mysterious and almost supernatural transformation of appearance” passed over him. Every pulse beat responsive to his, and throbbed with his own mighty indignation. He turned his withering invective upon the clergy, speaking of their greediness, oppression, and meanness, until they fled from the court. Spectators say that their blood ran cold and their hair stood on end! When he concluded, the jury in an instant brought judgment for one penny damages! a new trial was refused, and the young but unparalleled orator was borne away in triumph by the shouting multitude.

His first appearance in the house of Burgesses was not less brilliant, and far more important in its results. The majority of the Assembly seemed to be bent on new petitions and remonstrances against the oppression of England, when Henry introduced his celebrated resolutions, declaring in plain phrases that the acts complained of were unconstitutional and void. This, which was little short of a declaration of war, was received, even by well-meaning patriots, with a storm of opposition. A most bitter debate followed. Henry at first stood almost alone, with the wealth and talent of the Assembly arrayed against him. But his clear conviction, determined will, and powerful eloquence turned the scale, and the resolutions passed, committing Virginia to the cause of resistance.

When Henry attended the first Congress he found an array of men, whose fame was already becoming world-wide. But he soon won his way to the very highest rank among them, and maintained it to the close. His extraordinary eloquence excited the same astonishment on this broader field, as in the seclusion of the Virginia hills. It was “Shakespeare and Garrick combined.” When he took his seat after 160his opening speech, the first speech that had broken the silence of the great assembly, there was no longer a doubt that he was the greatest orator in America, and probably in the world. This pre-eminence he maintained all through the exciting struggle. His voice was ever like an inspiration, and the people looked up to him almost as a prophet.

His vast power remained until the close of his life. The last great speech, made in a contest with John Randolph, when he was nearly seventy years of age, and only three months before his death, was equal to any of his former efforts. “The sun had set in all its glory.”

These few sketches will sufficiently illustrate the eloquence of this wonderful man. It only remains to state what is known in regard to his methods of preparation. He never wrote. His mightiest efforts were made in situations where the use of the pen would have been impossible. The Virginia resolutions were written on a blank leaf in a law book, and during the whole of the terrible debate which followed, he was ever ready, and mastered all opponents. He thought much, but wrote little. He spoke only on great occasions, while in political life, but gave attention to all that was passing, and by keen observation learned the characters of those upon whose minds he wrought. Thus he was prepared to drive every word home to its mark. He was a great student of history, and this knowledge doubtless contributed very greatly to the clearness and precision of his views upon the great struggle in which the country was engaged, as well as gave him an ample fund of illustration in his speeches. Study of character and of history, cultivation of the power of narration and of language, seem to have been the means by which his wonderful natural genius was fitted for its triumphs.

GEORGE WHITEFIELD.

Few men of any age have been instrumental in accomplishing more good than the subject of our present sketch. Without deep logical powers, and with little claim to originality 161of thought, he chained vast multitudes by his eloquence, and was one of the foremost actors in a mighty religious movement.

None of the converts Whitefield gathered into the church ever passed through a more strongly marked experience in personal religion than he did. The agony of conviction he underwent was terrible, and he struggled long and desperately before he obtained peace. “God only knows,” he exclaims, “how many nights I have lain upon my bed groaning under what I felt. Whole days and weeks have I spent in lying prostrate on the ground, in silent or vocal prayer.” His mind almost failed under the violence of his mental conflicts, and he endeavored, by wearing the meanest apparel, and almost continual fasting, and many works of self-mortification to find relief. But all this was in vain. We see in it an indication of the terrible earnestness and sincerity of the man—qualities which never passed away from him. These months of vivid emotion affected his whole life, and imparted an intensity to his pictures of sin, and a vividness to his realization of its horrors, that he never would have had otherwise.

At last his health gave way beneath the pressure of his spiritual trials, and he fell into a long sickness. At the end of seven weeks he found peace, and his raptures became as great as the horrors of conscience had been. “But oh! with what joy, joy unspeakable, even joy that was full of glory, was my soul filled, when the weight of sin went off, and an abiding sense of the love of God and a full assurance of faith broke in upon my disconsolate soul.” This rapturous experience continued with few interruptions through life, and really formed the spring of his wonderful exertions. For thirty-four years his soul glowed in all the fervors that he had experienced at his first conversion, and he put forth his great strength in unwearied efforts to bring others to the same blessed enjoyment.

His career opened with wonderful brilliancy. The first sermon preached after his ordination as deacon, was said to 162“have driven fifteen persons mad,”—a kind of madness that soon became common in England. Everywhere the people flocked to hear him in crowds, and soon no church would contain the multitude, even when they were opened for him. Once, when preaching with “great freedom of heart and clearness of voice,” with thousands of persons standing outside of the church, after hundreds had gone away for want of room, he was struck with the thought of preaching the word in the open air. Friends discouraged, but the die was soon cast, and from that time forward his mightiest triumphs were won in imitation of his Master, “who had a mountain for His pulpit, and the heavens for a sounding board!” This was the proper theater for the display of his wonderful power, and his spirit felt the beauty and grandeur of the scene. Sometimes as many as twenty thousand people were gathered together.

The theater of his most marvelous triumphs was at Moorfields during the Whitsun holidays. The lowest class of London population was then poured forth, and the most riotous scenes enacted. He resolved to begin early, in order to secure the field before the greatest rush of the crowd. Ten thousand people were gathered impatiently waiting for the sports of the day. “He had for once got the start of the devil,” and soon drew the multitude around him. At noon he tried again. The odds against him were greater. Between twenty and thirty thousand people were present, and shows, exhibitors, and players were all busy. He shouted his text, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians,” and began the battle. It was waged fiercely, and stones, dirt, and rotten eggs, with every other means of annoyance, were brought to bear on the steadfast preacher. “My soul,” he says, “was among lions.” But soon his wonderful power transformed the multitude into lambs.

At night he renewed the assault on the stronghold of the adversary. Thousands had been added to the throng, and their leaders, who had lost much of their day’s gain by his preaching, were determined to endure it no longer. A harlequin 163attempted to strike him with a whip but failed. A recruiting sergeant, with many followers, and with drum and fife, made the next effort. But Whitefield called to the people to make way for the king’s officer, and the people yielded before, and closed up behind him, until he was in this manner conducted harmlessly out of the crowd. Next, a large number combined together, and taking hold of a long pole charged furiously on the assembly, roaring like beasts. But they too were foiled, and threw down the pole, many of them joining the hearers. At times the tumult rose like the noise of many waters, drowning the voice of the preacher, who would then resort to singing, until silence returned. He kept the field to the last, and gathered mighty spoil into his Tabernacle that night.

Very different were the sermons he preached at the mansion of Lady Huntingdon, but they were marked by the same power. Courtiers and noblemen joined in praising him, and Hume declared that he would go twenty miles to hear him. No one seemed to be impervious to his wonderful eloquence, and even in this selected circle he gathered trophies of the Cross.

He passed and repassed from England to America several times, and was everywhere as a flame of fire. The languid zeal of lukewarm churches was revived, and the careless and immoral led into new lives. He was soon looked up to as an apostle by thousands who dated their first religious impressions from the time when they listened to his fervid words. But opposition was not wanting, and once he very nearly received the crown of martyrdom.

After he had finished preaching in Dublin, he was attacked by an immense mob of infuriated Papists. His friends fled for their lives, and left him to the mercy of the rioters. Stones from every direction struck him, until he was breathless and dripping with blood. He found a momentary refuge, when almost at the point of death, but the inmates of the house which he had entered, fearing it would be demolished, entreated him to leave. He was offered a disguise, but refused 164it, and in his proper dress passed through whole streets of threatening Papists, and as soon as he had reached a place of safety, and had his wounds dressed, began to preach again!

Thus year after year passed, crowded full of labors. He considered it an indication of great feebleness that for a short time he could only preach one sermon a day. Thousands in Europe and America called him blessed, and everywhere countless multitudes crowded to hear him speak of the grace of God. For the lifetime of an ordinary generation his unequaled power and untiring labor continued. After speaking he frequently vomited great quantities of blood, which he regarded as relieving his over-taxed lungs.

His death was romantic and beautiful, as befitted such a life. There are few more touching, and yet more happy in the records of biography.

He preached his last field sermon at Exeter. It was continued for two hours, and was among his most powerful efforts. He reached Newburyport, Mass., the same evening, where he intended to preach the next day. While at supper, the pavement, and the hall of the house where he sat, were crowded with people impatient to hear the wonderful orator. But he was exhausted, and said to one of the clergymen who accompanied him, “Brother, you must speak to these dear people; I cannot say a word.” He took a candle and started for his room, but before he reached it, his generous heart reproached him for even seeming to desert the people who were hungering for the bread of life. He paused on the stairway, while the piece of candle he had taken when he started cast its flickering light on the crowd below, and began to speak. The people gazed with tearful awe and affection on his venerable form. His musical and pathetic voice flowed on in words of tenderness and exhortation until the candle went out in its socket. Before the morning he was dead!

His remembrance did not die with him. Europe and America vied together in mourning for him, and Methodists, Churchmen, and Dissenters revered him as a departed prophet.

165What was the secret of his unparalleled power with the people? Clearly its spring was his own profound and overwhelming emotions. It is sometimes thought that his almost perfect elocution explains the fascination he exerted, but it does not. He is classed by many as one who committed and recited his discourses. But it may be safely assumed that he could not have commanded one tithe of his success in that manner. He may have done this at the beginning of his career, before his marvelous genius was fully developed, but not after. It is indeed given as a reason of his embarrassment when he began to preach in the open air, that he had not long been accustomed to preach extempore. He says that often, in his own apprehension, he had not a word to say either to God or man. Think of a person who has a fully committed sermon, making such an assertion, and afterwards thanking God for giving him words and wisdom!

The very best possible evidence that his sermons took their external form at the moment, was that he complained of the reports that were made of them. If they had been written before preaching, he would have had the means of making these as perfect as desired. Yet he repeated sermons on particular subjects very often. Foote and Garrick estimated that they improved up to the thirtieth and fortieth repetition. Going over the same ground so often, many striking phrases would doubtless fix themselves in his mind, but he would still be free to introduce new matters as he wished. His illustrations, too, many of which were gathered from his own wide experience, would be given in nearly the same manner on successive occasions. But he was a fine talker, and by his unlimited practice in speech improved the power of language to such an extent that it was fully capable of expressing the ocean of feeling that flowed in his soul. His published sermons show few traces of the pen, but bear every mark of impassioned utterance. Untroubled by doubt, all that he preached was felt to be present reality. He was a pure and holy man, moved by the Spirit to the work he entered on, and endowed with a heart of fire, a soul of love, and a power of expression 166such as is given to few mortals. No wonder that the multitude felt him to be little less than inspired.

JOHN WESLEY.

Both Henry and Whitefield were men of such vast genius as to be lifted above ordinary rules. When we look upon them we feel imitation to be almost hopeless. But we will give an instance of an altogether different kind, and thus show how easily unwritten speech may be the medium of every species of address. John Wesley was not an impassioned or impetuous orator, and yet he wielded an almost boundless influence. He was fluent and easy in his language, but exact and logical, leaving no careless word on which an enemy might seize. Yet his power was great, and even the scenes of excitement that marked the preaching of Whitefield, and other early Methodists, were even surpassed under his clear calm words.

We have no intention of sketching the life and great achievements of Wesley, but will only consider a few events that bear on his character as a preacher. Before he found peace in believing, which he did not until he had preached for years, his sermons were not characterized by any extraordinary power. They were strong, clear, fluent, and no more. But after his return from his final voyage to America, there was a great change. The external characteristics remained nearly the same, but the fervor and power of the spirit that breathed through his mildest words, soon produced the opposite effects of exciting bitter enmity and of drawing the hearts of the people toward him. It mattered not what the nature of his congregations might be, there was something in his manner and words adapted to all. He began field preaching about the same time that Whitefield did, and sometimes gathered as many as twenty thousand into one congregation. While he spoke the whole assembly was often bathed in tears, and frequently many fell down as dead. He gathered those who were convinced by his preaching into societies, and these soon spread over the whole country. 167He was thus required to exercise more authority in caring for them than any bishop of the Established Church. For upwards of fifty years he averaged fifteen sermons a week.

Although Wesley was the founder of Methodism, yet he differed widely from the typical Methodist preachers. He dressed neatly, was most courteous and polished in manners, graceful in the pulpit, and considered violent exertions of the voice or furious gesticulation to be little less than sin. His published sermons are models of thoughtful analysis, close reasoning, and orderly arrangement. Yet he always spoke without manuscript and without memorizing.

Wesley would certainly have been justified, if any person ever was, in reading his discourses. For he was surrounded by those who had been led into the way of life by him, and who treasured up every word that fell from his lips, while on the other hand, unscrupulous enemies misrepresented him continually, and sought for occasion to accuse him of teaching pernicious doctrine. Yet amid such ceaseless preaching, he was always able to command the very words to express his ideas, and was never compelled to retract an unguarded sentence. The volumes of sermons which he published are to be regarded as mere abstracts of his teaching, recorded for the benefit of his societies, and not as the very words he used upon particular occasions. In his later years he came before the people, as a father instructing his children, and imparted to them the weighty truths he thought they ought to know, in all simplicity, and without the slightest care for outward ornament or word-nicety.

SIDNEY SMITH.

This eccentric, whole-souled, humorous, and eloquent clergyman was born in 1771, and died in 1835. He graduated at Oxford, received a fellowship, worth five hundred dollars a year, and thought to study law, but at the instance of his father, changed his mind and entered the Church. In connection 168with three others he started the Edinburgh Review, and for years contributed sparkling articles that did much to establish its reputation and popularity. He also became known to a wide circle for his brilliant conversational powers, and, like so many extempore speakers, took great delight in this most pleasant means of improvement.

At first his preferment in the Church was slow, but his favor with the people was undoubtful. While he preached in London large and fashionable audiences were drawn wherever he officiated.

Finally he was presented with an obscure country living, and after some delay went to it. It was a desolate place, far away from all the centers of intellectual life, and previous incumbents had resided away from it for more than a century. He says, “When I began to thump the cushion of my pulpit, on first coming to Foston, as is my wont when I preach, the accumulated dust of one hundred and fifty years, made such a cloud that for some minutes I lost sight of my congregation.”

He soon made a change for the better in all the affairs of the parish; built an ugly but comfortable parsonage, and won the devoted affection of his people. He passed much of his time in literary avocations, and after fourteen years, received preferment to more desirable churches. During the remainder of his life he used his pen so as to greatly increase his already wide reputation, and became still more noted as a preacher. He was very witty, and cared little for the common rules of sermonizing, but had a power and earnestness that compensated for every defect. The following extract will indicate his method of preparation:

“Pulpit discourses have insensibly dwindled from speaking to reading; a practice which of itself is sufficient to stifle every germ of eloquence. It is only by the fresh feelings of the heart that mankind can be very powerfully affected. What can be more ludicrous than an orator delivering stale indignation and fervor a week old; turning over whole pages of violent passions, written out in goodly text; reading the tropes and apostrophes into which he is hurried by the ardor 169of his mind; and so affected at a preconcerted line and page that he is unable to proceed any further!”

F. W. ROBERTSON.

No minister of the present generation has lived a purer life, or left the stamp of his thought more deeply on the public mind than the young incumbent of Trinity Chapel in Brighton. His sermons, not published until after his death, are meeting with an unparalleled sale, and every scrap of his sermon preparation, no matter how fragmentary, is seized for the press with the greatest avidity. He now addresses a far larger and more important audience than ever during his life time.

F. W. Robertson was born in 1816 and died in 1853—only thirty-seven years of age. He received the traditional English education at Oxford, and had a strong inclination for the military profession. This he was induced to renounce by the expressed judgment of his father—himself a military officer—that Frederick was better fitted for the Church. After he had received ordination, he acted as curate for twelve months at Winchester. His health being by this time broken, he took a trip to the continent under the advice of a physician. He was gone a year, and during this time entered into marriage. When he returned he served for four years in the parish of Cheltenham. Here the field for the exercise of his talents was comparatively narrow; but many persons were led to a higher life by his ministry—many more than he, with his habitual self-depreciation, was willing to believe until years had passed. After this he spent two months at St. Ebbs, in Oxford, receiving a miserably small salary. During this short time his talents became known, and he was offered the rich, aristocratic, and intellectual church at Brighton. The offer was refused at first, and was only accepted at last through the urgent solicitation of the Bishop, who felt that this was his proper field. Here his popularity became unbounded. The working people, who 170had almost deserted the Establishment, flocked to hear his bold, true words. His biographer says:

“His eloquence and originality could not fail to be marked. And if the congregation was intellectual he was pre-eminently so. The chapel became crowded. Sittings were scarcely ever to be had. For six years the enthusiasm never slackened: it grew and spread silently and steadily, and when he died broke out in a burst of universal sorrow.... But he put no faith in mere excitement, the eager upturned face, the still hush of attention. ‘What is ministerial success?’ he asks. ‘Crowded churches—full aisles—attentive congregation—the approval of the religious world—much impression produced? Elijah thought so; and when he found out his mistake, and discovered that the applause of Carmel subsided into hideous stillness, his heart well nigh broke with disappointment. Ministerial success lies in altered lives, and obedient humble hearts; unseen work recognized in the judgment day.’”

That success was his. James Anderson says:

“I cannot count up conquests in any place or by any man so numerous and so vast—conquests achieved in so short a period, and in many instances over the hearts and consciences of those whom, from their age or pursuits, it is always most difficult to reach—as were the conquests of that devoted soldier of the cross of Christ.”

But his labors were too great for his strength. For at least two years before his death he preached in continual pain, and yet there was no abatement in his power. Many of the sermons by which he is best known were then produced. We can scarcely realize as we read his calm sentences, radiant with beauty, and full of profound thought, that they were spoken during the ravages of a cerebral disease, that was soon to still his eloquent voice forever. When he died, having preached almost to the last, the city (containing sixty thousand inhabitants) was draped in gloom, and mourning was universal. A monument was erected, to which the working-men contributed a touching memorial.

The manner in which so many of Robertson’s sermons were preserved, is, when we consider his manner of preaching, 171very remarkable. He spoke extempore, and never wrote out a sermon before delivery. His leading thoughts were indicated by short notes, and the whole subject was carefully arranged in his own mind. But his words and his most powerful illustrations sprang from the inspiration of the moment. Usually he took a small piece of paper containing the headings of his thoughts with him into the pulpit, but never referred to it after the first few moments had passed. His sympathizing biographer thus describes him:

“So entirely was his heart in his work, that in public speaking especially, he lost sight of everything but his subject. His self-consciousness vanished. He did not choose his words or think about his thoughts. He not only possessed, but was possessed by his idea; and when all was over and the reaction came, he had forgotten like a dream, words, illustrations, almost everything.... After some of his most earnest and passionate utterances, he has said to a friend: ‘Have I made a fool of myself?’

“If the most conquering eloquence for the English people be that of the man who is all but mastered by his excitement, but who, at the very point of being mastered, masters himself—apparently cool, while he is at white heat—so as to make the audience glow with fire, and at the same time respect the self-possessed power of the orator—the man being always felt as greater than the man’s feelings—if that be the eloquence that most tells upon the English nation, he had that eloquence. He spoke under tremendous excitement, but it was excitement reined in by will. He held in his hand a small piece of paper with a few notes on it when he began. He referred to it now and then; but before ten minutes had gone by it was crushed to uselessness in his grasp; for he knit his fingers together over it, as he knit his words over thought. His gesture was subdued; sometimes a slow motion of his hand upward; sometimes bending forward, his hand drooping over the pulpit; sometimes erecting himself to his full height with a sudden motion, as if upraised by the power of the thought he spoke. His voice—a musical, low, penetrative voice—seldom rose; and when it did it was in a deep volume of sound which was not loud, but toned like a great bell. It thrilled also, but that was not so much from feeling as from the repression of feeling. Toward the close of his ministry he was wont to stand almost motionlessly 172erect in the pulpit, with his hands loosely lying by his side, or grasping his gown. His pale, thin face and tall, emaciated form, seeming, as he spoke, to be glowing as alabaster glows when lit up by an inward fire. And, indeed, brain and heart were on fire. He was being self-consumed. Every sermon in those latter days burned up a portion of his vital power.”

But though thus surrounded by an admiring congregation, and weekly giving out thoughts that were worthy of still wider notice, when some of his people, who realized that his words were too precious to die, raised a subscription to employ a short-hand reporter, with a view to the publication of his sermons, he refused to sanction the scheme, and wrote the parties a characteristic letter, telling them that he had no time to correct, and, without it, the discourses were not fit to be given to the public. Yet a number were preserved in this way, and though not published until after his death, they are almost faultless in form and expression. Other sermons were written out briefly by himself, after being preached, for the use of some private friends. It was thus that those almost incomparable discourses were preserved, which are without doubt the most valuable contribution that has been made to their department of literature during the present century.

We will give two extracts showing the power that may be wielded over language without the use of the pen. The first is from a speech made to a workingman’s institute opposing the introduction of infidel works into their library. He is speaking of the compassion that should be shown to the honest doubter:

“I do think that the way we treat that state is unpardonably cruel. It is an awful moment when the soul begins to find that the props on which it has blindly rested so long are many of them rotten, and begins to suspect them all; when it begins to feel the nothingness of many of the traditionary opinions which have been received with implicit confidence, and in that horrible insecurity begins also to doubt whether there be anything to believe at all. It is an awful hour—let him who has passed through it say how awful—when 173this life has lost its meaning, and seems shriveled into a span; when the grave appears to be the end of all, human goodness nothing but a name, and the sky above this universe a dead expanse, black with the void from which God Himself has disappeared. . . . I appeal (for the truth of the picture drawn) to the recollection of any man who has passed through that hour of agony, and stood upon the rock at last, the surges stilled below him, and the last cloud drifted from the sky above, with a faith, and hope, and trust, no longer traditional, but of his own, a trust which neither earth nor hell shall shake thenceforth for ever.”

The second passage we will quote is an illustration from a sermon on the doubt of Thomas, showing how weak are all arguments for immortality, except those that are exclusively Christian. He speaks of many things that are valuable as suggestions, but worthless as proofs, and next shows how the same suggestions may point the other way:

“Six thousand years of human existence have passed away. Countless armies of the dead have set sail from the shores of time. No traveler has returned from the still land beyond. More than one hundred and fifty generations have done their work and sunk into the dust again, and still there is not a voice, there is not a whisper from the grave to tell us whether, indeed, those myriads are in existence still. Besides, why should they be? Talk as you will of the grandeur of man; why should it not be honor enough for him—more than enough to satisfy a thing so mean—to have had his twenty or seventy years life-rent of God’s universe? Why must such a thing, apart from proof, rise up and claim to himself an exclusive immortality? . . . Why may he not sink, after he has played his appointed part, into nothingness again? You see the leaves sinking one by one in autumn, till the heaps below are rich with the spoils of a whole year’s vegetation. They were bright and perfect while they lasted, each leaf a miracle of beauty and contrivance. There is no resurrection for the leaves—why should there be one for man? Go and stand, some summer evening, by the river side; you will see the May-fly sporting out its little hour in the dense masses of insect life, darkening the air a few feet above the gentle swell of the water. The heat of that very afternoon brought them into existence. Every gauze wing is traversed by ten thousand fibres, which 174defy the microscope to find a flaw in their perfection. The omniscience and the care bestowed upon that exquisite anatomy, one would think cannot be destined to be wasted in a moment. Yet so it is. When the sun has sunk below the trees its little life is done. Yesterday it was not; tomorrow it will not be. God has bidden it be happy for one evening. It has no right or claim to a second; and in the universe that marvelous life has appeared once and will appear no more. May not the race of man sink like the generations of the May-fly? Why cannot the Creator, so lavish in His resources, afford to annihilate souls as He annihilates insects? Would it not almost enhance His glory to believe it?”

Such language Robertson was able to employ without the use of the pen. But the art was not attained without long and laborious toil. He committed much—memorizing the whole Testament, both in English and Greek, and storing his mind with innumerable gems from the poets. He also studied the modern languages, particularly German, and delighted to translate their treasure into his own tongue. He read much, but not rapidly, dwelling upon a book until he could arrange the whole of its contents with precision in his mind. Thus he attained an almost unequalled mastery of both thought and language. If he had been required to write every sermon, he could never have pursued such a thorough and long continued course of cultivation, besides mastering such a vast amount of knowledge.

We have dwelt less upon the general character of his preaching, with its strong originality, than upon the beauty, force, and accuracy of his language, because these are the qualities usually believed to be unattainable without written composition. But it is safe to say, that in these respects he has not been surpassed by any preacher ancient or modern.

HENRY CLAY.

We will take Henry Clay as an example of the American political eloquence of the last generation. He was one of a bright constellation of great men—most of them, like himself, extemporaneous speakers. In some respects he was, perhaps, 175superior to them all. His hold upon the public mind was great, and even yet he is regarded with love and reverence all over the Union. This, however, is not the result of his genius alone. In some points his great rivals were more unfortunate than himself. Calhoun’s influence was immense; but the effect of his teaching has been so deadly that it is not to be wondered at if his fame is of an equivocal kind. The badness of Webster’s private life, and his unfortunate course on some great questions, caused his reputation to decline, and his really great abilities to be undervalued. But the genial, large-hearted orator of the West is still a favorite with the people.

Clay was a Virginian by birth. His father was a Baptist preacher, very poor, who died when Henry was quite young, leaving a large family of children. Henry obtained all his schooling, which was meager enough, in a log school-house. The young boy was employed first as a clerk in a store, and afterward as an assistant in a lawyer’s office. Next he became an amanuensis to Chancellor Wythe, who treated him kindly and gave him an opportunity to study law. Finally, he was admitted to the bar, and removed to Kentucky. He immediately acquired practice, and met with a hearty welcome from the rough backwoodsmen of that section. He tells us how he acquired the ability to speak with fluency and power:

“I owe my success in life to one simple fact, namely, that at an early age I commenced and continued for some years the practice of daily reading and speaking the contents of some historical or scientific book. These off-hand efforts were sometimes made in a corn-field; at others in the forest; and not unfrequently in some barn, with the horse and ox for my only auditors. It is to this early practice of the art of all arts that I am indebted for the primary and leading impulses that stimulated my progress and have shaped and molded my destiny.”

An amusing instance is given of Clay’s first attempt at debate. He was so much embarrassed that he forgot where he was, and called the chairman “Gentlemen of the Jury.” 176Yet when this difficulty had been overcome, he soon made a powerful impression. In fact it was spoken of by some as not inferior to any of the addresses in which he achieved a national fame. The policy of emancipation was then under debate in Kentucky, and young Clay gave it his full support. But although he had almost unbounded influence on any other subject, the people of his State loved slavery better than any man, and the measure was defeated.

The vast power of Clay as an orator was early displayed. When only twenty-two years of age he, with another very able speaker, addressed a popular meeting. While the other spoke there was great applause and deafening acclamations, but Clay’s address was so much more thrilling and effective, that the popular feeling became too deep for utterance, and he closed amid unbroken silence. It was some moments before the crowd recovered sufficiently to give vent, in thundering cheers, to the emotion that he had kindled.

It is hardly necessary to follow the career of Clay through all the years that were devoted to the public service, for the country is still familiar with it. Many of the measures with which he was connected may not meet our approval, but no one will question the honesty of his motives, or the ability with which they were advocated. In Congress he had scarcely a rival. Calhoun was equally active, and more logical, but had not the magic of voice and eye, the nameless graces of delivery that distinguished the Kentucky orator. Webster spoke more like a giant, but was hard to call out in his full force, and on ordinary occasions did not speak nearly as well as Clay. The voice of the latter was an instrument of great power, and he well knew how to use it. “Nature,” he said on one occasion, referring to an effort made years before, “had singularly favored me by giving me a voice peculiarly adapted to produce the effects I wished in public speaking. Now,” he added, “its melody is changed, its sweetness gone.” These words were pronounced as if in mockery, in tones of exquisite sweetness. One who had heard him often, says:

177“Mr. Clay’s voice has prodigious power, compass, and richness; all its variations are captivating, but some of its base tones thrill through one’s whole fame. To those who have never heard the living melody, no verbal description can convey an adequate idea of the diversified effects of those intonations which, in one strain of sentiment, fall in whispering gentleness like the first words of love upon a maiden’s lips, and anon in sterner utterances ring with the maddening music of the main.”

A gentleman who witnessed an oratorical encounter between Clay and Webster describes it as inconceivably grand:

“The eloquence of Mr. Webster was the majestic roar of a strong and steady blast pealing through the forest; but that of Mr. Clay was the tone of a god-like instrument, sometimes visited by an angel touch, and swept anon by all the fury of the raging elements.”

Clay, Webster and Calhoun were all extempore speakers. Webster sometimes prepared very elaborately, but never confined himself to his preparation. And some of his very best efforts were made on the spur of the moment when circumstances conspired to arouse his vast but somewhat sluggish genius. Both the others prepared their discourses in thought alone, and those who were obliged to rely on their manuscripts or their memories stood no chance at all with them in the fiery debates through which they passed.

HENRY B. BASCOM.

It may be doubted whether the late Bishop Bascom is properly classed among extempore preachers. His mode of preparation certainly bordered on the memoriter plan. But he did not write. He would first construct a skeleton, usually very simple, and then throw each point into words mentally. His memory was very great, and the fine expressions he coined, as he rode through the forest or meditated in his study, were impressed on his mind so strongly as to be recalled afterward. It was a common practice with him to repeat his sermons over and over again to himself, till every line of thought and every strong expression became perfectly 178familiar. Bascom once stopped at a backwoodsman’s house, and left it to take a short walk. Soon a neighbor came rushing in, declaring that he had seen a crazy man walking back and forth on the edge of the woods, swinging his arms wildly, and muttering to himself in a strange manner. The neighbor was told not to be alarmed, but to come to church the next day and he would see the crazy man again. He did so, and listened to strains of eloquence as admirable as ever charmed his ear.